Archive for March, 2010


Very Successful Stock Trading Advice

Filed Under: Stock Trading Systems by Bill — Comments Off
March 21, 2010

If you have read the book or seen the video for “The Secret” you know that the premise is that what you think is what makes things happen.  There are other books like it, one being “The Jackrabbit Factor”.  This same premise is one of the secrets to make you a successful trader.

Successful traders are able to visualize their success.  They have a carefree attitude about their trades.  They know that all of their trades are going to be successful.  If they are not, they do not stress about it.  They go on to the next trade knowing that one will be successful.  The one that was not successful was an anomaly.  At least that is their attitude.  The unsuccessful traders bring more bad luck on themselves as they stress about the one that got away.  They are unable to go forward.  Instead they are always looking backwards.

Og Mandino in “The Greatest Secret in the World” states “I will waste not a moment mourning yesterdays misfortunes, yesterdays defeats, yesterdays aches of the heart, for why should I throw good after the bad.”  He also states “Forgetting yesterday, neither will I think of tomorrow.”  His premise that we can only do something about today, so lets make today worth everything we can.  Successful traders are able to do that.  They remove the emotion from their trading strategy and ignite successful trades by their sheer energy.

To be successful at anything, you should imitate those who are successful.  If you are unable to make money with your stock investments you should look at what those who are making money are doing.  The first thing you need to do is to visualize your success and then go for it.  The next thing you should do is to learn what strategies the successful traders are doing.  One way to do this is to sign up for a paper online trading game and peek in on what the winners are doing.  One game available from mystocktradingtips.com is Wall Street Survivor.  It has the capability to spy on the winners and what trades they are making.

Then go for it and have some fun.  Relax, it will be okay.

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How To Invest In Oil Stocks

Filed Under: Stock Pick of the Day by Bill — Comments Off
March 19, 2010

How to Invest in Oil

Even though the last couple of years have been largely dominated by an economic crisis, it is clear that the demand for energy is still increasing. In fact, it seems the world’s hunger for energy is almost insatiable. The implication, when it comes to investments, is that investing in oil still warrants serious consideration. But how can the average investor gamble on rising oil prices?

Oil ETFs

Exchange traded funds attempting to track the price of oil abounds. To invest in them, you simply buy shares, as you would with a company. Shares in Oil ETFs are traded on most, if not all, major stock exchanges.

Oil ETFs attempt to accurately mirror the price of oil through various instruments, mainly by trading in futures contracts and by investing in oil companies. The value of companies producing oil is closely correlated with the oil price, it is not a perfect correlation by any means, but there is a tendency of the value of oil stocks to rise, when the oil price does. In fact, for some companies, the value of the stocks tend to rise proportionally more than the oil price.

Oil Stocks

Smaller oil producing companies tend to see their value increase more than the proportional increase in the oil price. On the flip side, they also tend to see a larger fall in value when the oil price goes down. For the investor willing to tolerate significant risk, this presents the intriguing option of investing in oil companies. If the value of oil does indeed increase, a diversified portfolio of oil company stocks, should more than mirror that increase.

An easy way to invest in a diversified portfolio of oil companies is to invest in an oil mutual fund. Compared to piecing together a diversified portfolio yourself, this will save time and commissions. Compared to investing in just one oil stocks, this will drastically reduce risk.

Mutual Funds, Oil Companies, and Oil ETFs

There are a lot of options for investors looking to gain exposure to the price of oil. Which option you choose, should depend on why you want to invest in oil and how much risk you can live with.

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Finding Yield In A Low-Return Environment

Filed Under: Fundamental by Bill — Comments Off
March 18, 2010

It happens every time interest rates hover in the basement:  investors hungry for income search for creative (and usually risky) ways to get more yield in their portfolio.  Many of the traditional havens of income-oriented investors (like financial stocks and real estate) have been hit hard.  Nonetheless, it’s still possible to earn a decent yield in today’s market with investment bonds rates so low.

Reaching For Yield

FDIC Insured CD’s usually aren’t the first thing that comes to mind when you think of “high yield,” but it’s still possible to find a decent-yielding CD, and CD’s do have certain advantages not shared by many other investments (such as FDIC insurance).  The key to finding the highest interest CD is to use website like Bankrate.com or BestCashCow.com to scour the internet for deals nationwide so you are no longer limited by what your local banks are offering.

Municipal bonds are another oft-overlooked investment.  The best municipal bonds are save and currently pay taxable-equivalent yields significantly above what U.S. treasury bonds are currently paying.  It is true that some states, such as California, are in dire financial straits and are in danger of defaulting on their bonds, but most states are still relatively healthy, and diversification can help minimize these default risks.

Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITS) are perennial favorites of income investors, and thanks to massive losses in the real estate bust, now sport a reasonable yield.  Most REIT experts would like to see them yielding in the 6-7% range, but the mid 4′s are a far cry better than the lows seen at the peak of the real estate bubble.  REIT dividends also have the advantage of rising with inflation over long periods of time.

Financial Stocks are risky, no doubt about that.  But the banks who managed to survive the crisis are likely to benefit tremendously from the industry consolidation.  Wells Fargo, for example, got Wachovia for an absurdly-low price.  Risk-tolerant investors will likely be richly rewarded for picking through the wreckage of the financial sector.  This is probably best done through a mutual fund or ETF, though.

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Some Day Trading Strategies

Filed Under: Stock Trading Systems by Bill — Comments Off
March 17, 2010

Day trading is definitely an interesting concept.  The basics is that you are able to buy and sell stocks during a day before the stock market closes for the day.  You can trade many different things from currencies, stock options and of course stocks.  Trying to rely on luck in order to hopefully make money will end up biting you in the butt.  Instead, if you are focusing on certain day trading strategies, then you’ll be able to have a much better chance at turning a profit.

One of the best strategies that I can recommend to you is to just keep it simple, especially if you are just starting out with day trading.  often times beginners get overly excited and make a bunch of different trades all within a short time frame, and then they start to lose track of some.  Then, you can’t sell the stock for a profit anymore because you held onto it too long because you were focused on other stocks.  By focusing on one or two at a time, you can begin to learn day trading.

If you are new, I would stick to working with stocks.  If you are trying to learn currency trading at the same time you’re trying to learn day trading, you may not remember all of the information.  Stick to learning one thing at a time, and then you’ll be able to really learn the day trading strategies that you need.

Scalping is a great strategy for day trading.  Scalping is basically buying a stock and then immediately selling it as soon as it become profitable.  The normal mentality would be to try and hold out for as long as you can so that you can get the maximum amount from the stock.  But, if you sell it when it turns a profit immediately, you may not make as much money as you could, but you also don’t run the risk of actually losing money.  The best type of stock to do this with is one that is steadily rising in the day, so that you can be pretty sure that it will continue to rise.

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